A question to right wingers

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I have just spent some time reading a few of Ann Coulter's column on her webpage and over the last year or so I have tried reading as much right wing writing as possible. My question is: Do right wingers feel the same revulsion and fear for humanity when reading left wingers as I often feel when reading right wingers?

I have found that in my perception the right wing writers tend to avoid all the main points and jump on smaller issues and ignore or ridicule anything which may go against their view of the world. They also seem to truly hate democrats with an ire that is suprising, especially since most of the left wing writers tend not really like the democrats but find them atleast better than the republicans, the right wingers seems to idolize and worship any republican politician.

Do you conservatives out there feel pretty much the same way I do about the right wing writers and their views when you read "left wing" writers? I would also like to point out that it seems like anyone critizing the current US regime is labelled a left winger whether they like it or not.

 

Well, that is just like when you criticize Israel they call you anti-sematic, nazi, and/or jew-hater. Things like that just pisses me off.

 

When I read the writings of "left wingers" I don't get a feeling of "revulsion and fear for humanity" rather I get the feeling that I'm dealing with a child. The liberal cause is ridiculed as wanting to be a "Nanny State" in which the government keeps everyone warm, fat, and happy and even better those filthy rich mean people will pay for it. It is like I'm dealing with my eight year old son. He wants everything and he wants it given to him. Wanting to raise him properly he doesn't get everything and he has chores to do to "earn" his allowance. If he doesn't "work" he doesn't get the money. Oh you should here the howls if he doesn't get his money. It is amazing how similar it is to welfare and welfare reform.

Hopefully I've managed to not jump on a smaller issue.

 

joacqin,

The following is just my opinion. In no way am I trying to speak for all (regardless that it seems so in places), but I do believe that my views reflect the views of quite a few conservatives.

What you seem to basically be asking is: Are conservatives exactly like liberals, only with the opposite views in some areas? The answer is pretty much yes.

You say that RW people ignore the big picture, and concentrate on smaller issues. I would say to that the devil is in the details.

What frustrates the RWers is that in our opinion, the left uses "emotional logic" (my term) to make their point. Things like, "look at these poor children who are hungry, it is not their fault that their mom is a victim of society (read crack addict brood mare), we need to help them" to justify more welfare spending, but then they seem to spend the money in ways that are counterproductive to the elimination of the problem. It seems that LWers are always dealing with the symptoms, but are unwilling to attack the disease. In our view, RWer's are by nature fatalists and realists. We believe that the government cannot change the human condition, and that all the meddling that is done in the name of humanity only leads to more need for such meddling. If you eliminate the reality of human nature, then socialism is a great idea, but the fact is that too many people would rather suck milk from the governments breast than to get up and work their asses off to get ahead.

So to boil it down, RWers are feel that sacrifice is necessary for the benefit of society as a whole, and we see LWers as being too naive or soft to stomach the price of a much greater future.

I am quite certain that those on the left believe much the same of those on the right. The difference when you boil it down is that that the right believes that some people will only be motivated by the avoidance of misery and that as long as you keep giving them enough to avoid their threshold, they will stay unmotivated, while the left believes that the right is too niggardly to spend their precious wealth to help others in need, and that by providing a positive experience that people will become valuable assets to society.

IMO, a persons position on the right or left ultimately boils down to their view of humanity.

Boy, is that overly simplistic! Best I can do with a limited time and without writing a text book on the issue. Sorry

 

Similar. And as The Great Snook points out, it's a little bit like talking with children - I mean when we deal with real left and not with those filthy rich and great-business-sponsored "social democrats" of Poland who rush to kiss EU's asses in exchange for synecure prospects like they previously did to USSR. I mean, it still feels like talking to kids, but doubly naive ones - ones that think they're so smart they're going to own it all with a little bit of well strategically located ass kissing and common trickery, treating the electorate like kids who will believe what they're told and vote them anyway.

When you move on from bourgeoisified parliamentary left blood suckers to idealistic leftist writers and philosophers, it feels more like talking to complete kids. They're intelligent, they're smart, but they seem unfit for reality as well as utterly unwilling to apply basic common sense in their schemes.

Agreed, right wing politicians typically are like that. Left wing ones typically ignore smaller issues in the name of some vaguely undefined awareness that no one other than they seems to possess. And it doesn't seem to work in practice for the unitiated

And everyone criticising the critique is labelled right winger and so on. I must say I feel much the same way about left wingers as you about the right wingers, then again I feel the same way about those right wing liberal conservatives or conservative liberals depending how you call them.

While my opinion on this issue is similar, I believe that there is no such thing as absolute and natural ownership. Ownership is absolutely not natural and absolutely not absolute. Distribution of wealth is a result of how the system is built and how it works. Not everyone is on equal terms (that's a ridiculous right-winger slogan!), not everyone is given his chance and rarely is a great fortune of fair and square origin. Therefore, those who have more are to a certain extent responsible for those who have less. I don't support the idea of ripping the rich off their riches to support lazy bums who would rather spend someone else's money and spend someone's taxes at leisure, but I don't like the idea of other lazy bums getting richer and richer by just multiplying virtual money ad infinitum at the expense of those who are economically weaker and have circumstances forced on them.

 

All of you seem to have identified the left/right polarity with economy, which is the normal, especially European way of doing it. On that scale I am not very leftist at all.

What I meant was more of the "other" left/right distinction, IE war, defence, religion, morality and so on. Atleast I am glad that you selfproclaimed "rightist" havent read Coulter cause then you would have known what I meant as I mentioned her.

 

I feel the same way regarding the other issues you brought up.

In regards to war and defense I feel the left acts like children at the park. Everyone plays nicely because everybody has their mommy there with them. If somebody is doing something dangerous, or mean, etc. the mommies will step in and everyone will be fine. This goes totally against thousands of years of human nature. Forget about the international level, even at the local level every community has police and unfortunately criminals. If we can't even get 100% compliance with shoplifting how do you expect to get people bent on wars of aggression to behave.

As to religion and morality I have always thought that the left confuses themselves on the issues. They don't believe in religion (for lack of a better term) because they don't want to believe that they are not in entire control of their fate and destiny. Yet on the other hand they are quick to blame outside influences for every bad thing that happens (troubled home, low income, prejudice, etc). The right has more of a belief in personal responsibility. There is no excuse for committing a crime. I don't care if you are from a broken home, you do the crime you face the penalty. The right does like to believe that there is some master plan to the universe and that somebody is watching over us. However, we also live by the saying "The lord helps those who help themselves."

 

TGS, you are making a huge mistake. Not even half of all the Right-Wingers in the world is christian nor religous, most of them that I know only live to make money and to be on top of the world, nothing else.

 

Hmmm...Snook, Darkwolf and chevalier have pretty much said anything that I might say...so I could just snip, cut and paste and come up with a response I could call my own, but that would be taking the easy way out and relying on someone else...and I'm not a Liberal

I'll just shut-up and sit this one out

 

Well, actually, your response was one I was really interesting in Hacken.

I have obviously not been clear, I was wondering what you felt and thought when you read leftist writers, not what you thought about leftist/liberals in general. More thoughts on Moore, Franken amongst others. IE the more hardcore leftist people. As it was the more hardcore rightist I meant when I said I felt revolted and feared for humanity.

 

@Caleb

I admit I took a leap of faith. Joacqin was mentioning American authors on both sides of the political spectrum so I perhaps focused on the American definition of right vs. left wing.

However, I'm not quite convinced your opinion of "international right wingers" is accurate.

 

Agreed.

Well, but now to Joacqin's question update:

WAR: war is no good. It is always travesty of life and a great deal of destruction, pain, suffering and plain crime is unavoidable. To quote our Foreign Minister from August 1939: "We in Poland do not know the concept of peace at all cost", granted. But one must always bear in mind that war effort comes down to struggle for resources and military industry orders. In short: it is almost always about money, one way or another. Money and folly.

Here I oppose both warmongers and sheepish pacifists. Guess most people would label me leftist here. And rightists are childish and dangerous in their naivete.

Morality: morality is one thing, law is another. As a matter of gross simplification: so far as no one gets harmed, morals shouldn't be enforced. Especially if customs of different cultures are in question. We have to care about our kids' proper development, so public obscenity actually does bring harm. The choice between assuring someone's proper development and respecting his free will is a tough one. We can respect someone's free will to choose a bad option, but I don't feel like respecting someone's free will to sollicit those bad choices. Corruption of the weak minded does not belong within anyone's basic rights.

A great NO to: abortion and inducing miscarriage, lending legal protection and social benefits to concubinate, state-sanctioned same sex unions (especially calling them marriage), alcohol and cigarette advertising in anything that isn't expressly labelled ADULT, porn pictures in teen magazines (1. and I mean normal porn, not art 2. nudity isn't necessarily porn), sex-alluding adverts on publicly displayed billboards, display of violence for its own sake in public and in anything non-public that isn't expressly labelled ADULT.

Guess it makes me right. Leftists are childish and dangerous in their naivete.

Religion:

Freedom of faith and performance of cult without any illegal activity (doesn't mean they have to be pro-anything). Cooperation of state and churches in social matters. Religious marriages without the need to go to a civil office. Subsidising is OK, but not a single tax penny should be spent on getting new followers, advertising and the like. No forcing anyone to state his beliefs.

Proper proportions should be kept, though. Open air service, processions etc are fine, but demonstrations of Catholics in Protestant quarters or Protestant marches through Catholic quarters etc are not. No alien-worshipping sickos disturbing the traffic, either. And no overnight loud fests in densely inhabited areas.

I don't know if it's left or right, but the one remaining is childish

Defence:

Professional, highly trained, well motivated and well funded army with the best equipment possible within reasonable cost limits. Extensive tactical studies. Training for all willing and suitable, service for all willing and suitable if circumstances allow. Compulsory military service is not my idea of fun, but I can fathom the benefits country-scale. But train experts as army experts instead of mobbing them. I'm not elitist, but company is one of the reasons why I hate the idea of myself doing compulsory service. Even though if anyone is warrior blood I surely am.

No hawks, please. No warmongers. And no morons who build their carreers on rendering their nation helpless in order to show off what great peacemakers they are. Or those who think they have a brilliant idea of where to find money for their next election campaign

Extreme right-wingers and extreme left-wingers are probably equally childish regarding this one. Not like the centre is any good. They should just do like I say and the problem would be over

 

It's not surprising to find those on the so called "right" heaping personal attacks on "liberals." Rather than to approach the issues and creating a dialogue of specifics, the "other side" is compared to "children." How intelligent. Such microscopic and narrow illustrations reveal the mentality of those who throw such rhetoric around. The forum rules prevent me from saying what I really think of those condescending and patronizing comments. I had personally credited some of the main offenders with way more class than they have shown they possess on this thread.

 

Yes, but we should address specifics. If you feel the poor are getting too much from the government, then name the program and say why you would axe it, or how you would change that program to make it work better.

I will give you an example: The cash-pay-outs that were given to Iraqis. How many billions? It's meant to improve conditions in Iraq, yes? To move the Iraqi economy. But yet, would we do the same for the citizens in this country? We might, but I don't hear those conservatives who support the war complaining about give-a-ways to Iraqis. Do you? Why would you take lunch programs from school children and healthcare from the elderly to give to Iraq? It might make sense: Let's blow-up Iraq and then let the American taxpayer rebuild it, at the cost of our system of education, healthcare, social security and job programs. Yeah, right. Do you think we are rebuilding some of those systems for the Iraqis? You bet. And then conservatives will cry: Look at all the good we did in Iraq!

Wow, yes, but at the expense of our own country; our own children; our seniors, and our workers. We can have a dialogue about the issues, or we can sit around and make comments like: "Liberals and progressives are like children." They want to take money away from the "rich." Yes, I'm sure Bill Gates is suffering mightily at the moment, especially at the hands of the "poor."

 

dmc brought up another topic here which was I was also interested in when I started this thread: "preaching to the choir", that is what almost every single pundit does, no matter his/her stance. I find that kinda sad. I try to read as much as possible from as many as possible (but then again I am very interested in this kind of stuff and am soon to be a finished social science teacher) cause I think that if you are submitting your brain to the assault from one side you should atleast give the other side a chance and listen to what they have to say. For me while doing that have given me a much more critical and cautios stance when reading the left wingers which I mostly tend to agree with. However, even if reading some right wing rhetorics have made me a bit more moderate in my own opinions it have at the same time made me *more* rabid as I find what I read from the right wingers to be so despicable and outright dangerous to humanity at times that they should never ever be allowed within an inch of any power whatsoever. I am sad to say but this isnt an exaggeration but their rhetoric is echoing the pundits and politicians who wroke havoc in the world during the first half of the last century. Doing their best to whip people up in a frenzy where they are willing to do anything.

For me economics have little to nothing to do with this, Stalin and Hitler both used this kind of rhetoric to flame up their people (and so did even the "democratic" leaders of the 20th century to convince their people they should sacrifice a few generations of young men on the altar of war) and they had different approaches on how to deal with the economy.

So an additional question is: If you read left/right wing demagogues do you read the other side too when the oppurtunity shows itself?

 

@Chandos the Red:

I mean absolutely no attack on you, but I cannot agree with your stance. I consider it erroneous and I'm going to show you why. I hope you reconsider it when you have finished reading:

And the liberals are innocent of that, I understand? No, the truth is that political debates amount in major part to exchanging more or less craftily disguised attacks and insults.

Please allow me to quote joacqin's opening question: "Do right wingers feel the same revulsion and fear for humanity when reading left wingers as I often feel when reading right wingers?". Note also that the first opinion in this thread came from a left-aligned person and was not positive. Yet still no one from the right side had any problem with that (as it was made clear it was an opinion and the author sought no confrontation but was merely interested in discussing feelings framing everything in a commendably polite way) Any "dialogue of specifics" rhetoric is swaying from the subject in order to score cheap points by presenting the competition as insensitive, emotionally unstable and intellectually limited. The latter is supported by

and just a few words after complaining about rightists exercising their freedom of speech in saying that talking to leftists feels like talking to children. Note also that there is no personal attack in that. The question is "how does it feel?" and it is responded honestly, without beating around the bush nor adding a ton of sweet politically correct double speech in which liberals seem to excel at the cost of actually saying anything of substance.

That sounds so... liberal. No offence, it's just the style of speech that is easily connected with the left side. I instantly recognise it even though I typically hear it another language.

Next, "the mentality of those[...]" is clearly personal and has nothing to do with any "dialogue of specifics". Dismissing the whole of what the opposition says as "such rhetoric" (empty rhetoric?) without yourself providing any substance at all is what it looks like.

It only surprises me how you can at the same time react with righteous anger to someone stating that talking to the leftists feels like talking to children.

What is that if not a condescending and patronising comment? Plus, forum rules only forbid personal attacks and insults, so it gives the impression that's what you would post if you were allowed. It would also be the same sin of which you accuse your opposition - so where would the difference be? It would be the same for both of you.

Again, talk about condescending?

In other words, you could simply say "I have more class than all those who disagree with me".

Next, that's a personal attack on your opposition's character ("more class than they possess"). Plus, when someone uses such words as "offenders" he is expected to back his words and be innocent himself.

That's why, even though I'm not aligned with any right wing ideology and I have at least pro-social views on many aspects of economy and governance, and am not a big fan (mildly stated) of right side politicians, I feel I need to stand up for the right-wingers here. I respect your right to your own opinion, but it's not like you can make unfounded claims and throw mud around for the same sins as you commit yourself. People might have taken offence.

If I appear unfair, please consider points where I refer to the right wing, even in this thread.

[ May 05, 2004, 14:39: Message edited by: chevalier ]

 

These points rasied I feel do speak to the topic at hand, with maybe the exception of one or two:

I never said they couldn't say it, only that it showed a lack of class and a narrow viewpoint to say it. The "free speech" argument is irrelevant here. There are serious conservative writers at work today - William F. Buckley, William Safire are examples. I would not often cringe at their articles (well, maybe a few times) the way I would at those of Rush or Hamnity.

Have you read any of the posts between Grey Magistrate and me? We seem to be able to argue and find points of agreement without resorting to any personal attacks or name-calling.

I never took Joacqin's post to mean all rightwingers, only those writers in the media, but perhaps he meant all right wingers. But knowing how fair minded he is, I really doubt he meant those who post on this board as an example of the kind "rightwing writing" he found so disagreeable.

Which issues are you referring to?

And this is personal:

No, those are your words - I never said any such thing. You did.

The difference is that I did not say it. But you did. My comments were very mild compared to what I would have said.

[ *Ahem* Tal's post is directly above yours. What part of " ... no more debate in this direction" or "stick to the topic" did you not get? ] - Beren

[ May 06, 2004, 06:38: Message edited by: Beren ]

 

I may be coming to the dance late, and without a date, but waaaay back up the page, Joacqin specifically mentioned wanting to hear my opinion on this issue. I must confess, I really haven't read the posts very closely since that point, so whatever I write is addressing Joacqin's original question.

First off, I don't tend to listen to political commentators at either end of the spectrum...I find the Liberals to be rather naive and unrealistic, and I find the Conservatives to be...drumroll...rather mean. I concur with your feelings about the mean-spiritedness that the Conservative voices tend to give off. Mind you, I'm not talking about someone who espouses and speaks out for Conservative ideals, but those people who make a living attacking the "other" side...the whole thing looks to me to be played out like a chess match...with either side not really caring about the populace who's fate they debate, but whether they can counter the opposition. I see this whole thing as an industry, a game, a moneymaking device...if Al Franken really cared about the downtrodden Americans, he would make his book free on the web...if Rush Limbaugh really wanted to maintain the values of traditional America...he would accept only enough advertising on his syndicated show to cover expenses...these people have found a way to attract a crowd, without having the talent to perform on stage or field. I tend to ignore all of them, unless I listen to either side for a diversion...try looking at it from that perspective, and perhaps it will bother you less.

As far as the things that really frighten me...it's not the big things that these braying donkeys raise...it's the little things that seem to slip under the radar that I fear will doom our society. Things like Neoconservatism, Socialized welfare, gay marriages...they don't bother me as much as the rampant acceptance of situational ethics, the gentle push for parents to turn over the care of their children to "professionals", the disregard for the value of life that is expressed, not in the extreme by abortion, but in the minutia by the widespread acceptance of artificial birth control. Just as the old analogy that the best way to cook a pot of frogs is to slowly raise the temp of the water, it's the little things that are the most menace to society and our future...the big things will always find a champion on either side...but the little ones will curl up next to you and be part of you before you realize that you didn't really want them there, and by the time you see them...they feel normal and acceptable.

In closing, I think it's wrong to paint Liberals as childish and Conservatives as mean...the people who hold those ideals are people in every sense that you and I are. They work, go to school, pay taxes, get sick, laugh, love their children...no Conservative or Liberal has an express monopoly on these basic measures of human existence. I have made some of my greatest "friendships" on these boards through disagreement...and have gained what I think is a rather enlightened perspective on "WHY" people feel like they do as more important than "WHAT" they think.

I tend to often post comments that are sarcastic or biting, but I can gurantee you that they are always done in a tongue in cheek way. I have my beliefs, I truly think they are right, but I never want to reach the point where I use my beliefs like a hammer to bludgeon someone who disagrees with me...and I don't support anyone who does so...and that is exactly what all these pundits, right or left, do.

I hope I answered the question at hand.